Under-Rated: Too Human
By Chris Cesarano
About a month ago now I played Grand Theft Auto 4 for the first time. It was also my first introduction to the franchise. This is a game series that never fails to score 9’s or even perfect 10’s with each new iteration, hailed by critics and gamers alike as a great game, and has become a complete money making machine of an intellectual property.
I never cursed so much at a game in my life as I did in the three hours I played the game. The controls felt awkward, the combat mechanics were beyond third rate, the mandatory car for a mission controlled like complete crap, and trying to replay a failed mission didn’t bring you back to the state before you actually attempted the mission. It takes you back someplace far away from where you were, and without the car you were originally driving. The game offered no manual save option that I could see, so it was impossible to spam saves before each mission. You just had to hope you didn’t have to replay too much when loading up your last auto-save, just so you can have a car and start someplace more advantageous than if you were to take the option to restart the failed mission.
I traded this exemplary piece of bad game design in to help pay for Resident Evil 5, and I have no regrets.
“But Chris,” you say, “what does this have to do with Too Human?”
It has to do with the fact that critics and gamers have, for some reason, chosen to ignore all the flaws of some games while kicking others to the side for the smallest problems. Too Human is certainly a flawed title, yes, but most of those flaws arise simply because the designers were trying something new. Instead of forcing a player to button mash their foes apart, Silicon Knights tried to simplify the system so it runs more smoothly and fast-paced. To accomplish this, they tied the attack controls to both thumbsticks.
For those that have not played, movement is controlled with the left thumbstick while the right controls who you attack. This is accomplished simply by pressing in the direction of the foe you want to strike. The first reaction by most gamers was to rapidly tap the right stick in that direction, which felt clunky, awkward and as if you were about to break your controller. The game allows for advanced attacks with other buttons, as well as combinations of how you manipulate the two thumbsticks to pull off powerful maneuvers, but the basics revolve around pointing at enemies with the right thumbstick.
There are two problems associated with this design. The first is that it isn’t as responsive as it could be. There are some frustrating moments where your character doesn’t seem to strike at the foe you wish him to, or the game doesn’t pull off the advanced attack that you wanted. While these can be a bit frustrating, the game always continues at a fast pace, knocking enemies aside left and right. The developers wanted you to feel like a God when playing the game, and most often you do. It just takes a little patience to get used to a new form of control, which, overall, works a lot better than mashing a button repeatedly. After a few minutes with the game, anyone can be zipping across the battlefield, knocking foes away left and right. The gameplay benefits from the new controls overall, even though it has a few problems here and there.
The second problem associated with this control design is the camera. Because the right thumbstick is now used for combat, the player cannot use it to regularly manipulate the camera. The developers did their best to work the camera so that it may show anything the player needs to be paying attention to, but just in case they included the ability to hold down a button and use the thumbstick to manipulate the camera manually. It can break the adrenaline rush a bit as you have to adjust where you can see in the middle of a fight, but it is better than offering nothing at all.
Where this system fails is when the game tries to deliver a more cinematic camera angle. There are many moments where the camera is fixed, and there is no real manipulation options available. These are the scenes where most of the problems and frustration tend to occur, but it’s not like players haven’t had to deal with bad cameras before.
Overall, the game’s combat is designed excellently, gathering new items and equipment can be exciting, and the co-op is as good as any. By changing around the enemies that appear in co-op, the game also gains added life expectancy, transforming the levels you already played in single player with new and interesting challenges.
Unfortunately, because of having to try something new, most gamers gave up before finishing the demo. Merely reading the comments to the Zero Punctuation review is almost nauseating, as so many feel justified that playing the demo for five minutes and shutting it off gave an accurate impression of the entire game.
So Silicon Knights has suffered greatly for trying something new, attempting to innovate in an industry full of copycats and thieves, while a game as broken as Grand Theft Auto 4 gains the highest accolades and awards for…what?
If you are one of those people that played the Too Human demo and decided after five minutes that you didn’t like it, I challenge you to look at your game library and re-evaluate such a judgment. I guarantee there will be plenty of games with greater flaws than Too Human, but because they use more traditional controls you ignored these flaws and found the enjoyment. Especially if you somehow stomached all of the problems present in the first few hours of Grand Theft Auto 4 (I can’t even imagine how poor other mechanics in that game must have controlled if the basics were broken). Take the time to get used to something new instead of casting it aside and then complaining that the games industry is still and never tries to innovate.
If you have never played the demo, then give it a few tries. You cannot play this demo once, however, and get the full experience of it. The first play will see you adjusting to this new system of play, and once you have those basics down you can play the game for real in a second play of the demo. If you do this, I guarantee that the game will not be as bad as others have claimed. In fact, if you do it right, the game should be fun considering its fast pace and smooth design.
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